EPJ Web of Conferences 93, 010 53 (2015)
DOI: 10.1051/epjconf/ 201 5 9 3 010 53
C Owned by the authors, published by EDP Sciences, 2015
Study of the Pygmy Dipole Resonance in (p,p’γ) and (d,pγ) experiments with
SONIC@HORUS
S. G. Pickstone1 , a , V. Derya1 , A. Hennig1 , J. Mayer1 , M. Spieker1 , M. Weinert1 , J. Wilhelmy1 , and A. Zilges1
1
Institute for Nuclear Physics, Zülpicher Str. 77, D-50937 Cologne, Germany
Abstract. Last year, the new silicon-detector array SONIC with up to 8 silicon-detector positions was installed inside the existing γ-ray spectrometer HORUS consisting of 14 HPGe detectors. The combined setup
SONIC@HORUS allows for a coincident detection of γ-rays and light charged particles in the exit channel
of inelastic scattering and transfer reactions. As a first physics case, the Pygmy Dipole Resonance (PDR) in
92
Mo has been investigated in a (p,p’γ) experiment at E p = 10.5 MeV. Since a specific excitation energy can
be chosen offline in the coincidence data, the sensitivity to weak decay branchings of PDR states is increased.
Additionally, a second reaction mechanism for the excitation of PDR states has been tested with the new setup.
In a 119 Sn(d,pγ) transfer reaction at Ed = 8.5 MeV, PDR states in 120 Sn could be excited. Since this one-neutron
transfer reaction is sensitive to the neutron single-particle structure, it could reveal new information on the
microscopic structure of the PDR.
1 Introduction
Low-lying electric dipole strength in neutron-rich nuclei,
commonly denoted by Pygmy Dipole Resonance (PDR),
has recently attracted a lot of experimental and theoretical
interest due to its implications for the neutron skin [1], the
symmetry energy in the equation of state [2], and isotopic
abundances from astrophysical network calculations [3].
To complement to previous experimental approaches, presented in a recent review [4], a new experimental setup was
commissioned at the 10 MV Tandem accelerator at the Institute for Nuclear Physics in Cologne. This setup consists
of the HPGe-detector array HORUS for high-resolution γray spectroscopy and the silicon-detector array SONIC for
light charged-particle identification and spectroscopy and
will be described in more detail in section 2. By applying the particle-γ coincidence technique, this setup enables
the investigation of the PDR in inelastic particle-scattering
and light-ion transfer reactions to learn more about its underlying structure.
2 Experimental setup
2.1 γ-ray detection: HORUS
The HORUS array is an HPGe-detector array consisting
of 14 HPGe detectors, 6 of which are equipped with BGO
shields for active Compton suppression. Under typical experimental conditions, it has a photo-peak efficiency of
the order of 2% at 1.3 MeV and a resolution of 2 keV at
1.3 MeV. Due to the granularity of the setup, it has already
a e-mail: [email protected]
been used very successfully for γ-γ coincidence experiments and to extract multipolarities from angular correlations of the emitted γ-rays.
2.2 Particle detection: SONIC
The new particle-detector array SONIC consists of passivated implanted planar silicon (PIPS) detectors inside the
target chamber on up to 8 positions. To allow for particle
identification, each position can be equipped by a ΔE-E
telescope of two detectors of 300 μm and 1500 μm thickness. The active area of one detector is 150 mm2 , leading
to a maximum solid angle coverage of the whole array of
4%. The energy resolution of the PIPS detectors is 15 keV
using a 241 Am standard source, but is worsened in beam
to around 70 keV due to straggling effects in the target and
the solid angle coverage of the detectors.
2.3 Particle-γ coincidences: SONIC@HORUS
The great improvement for nuclear physics experiments comes from the combination of the two devices
(SONIC@HORUS). Since the excitation energy E X can
be determined from the ejectile energy, a two-dimensional
matrix can be constructed with the excitation energy and
the γ-ray energy as axes, see Fig. 1. In this matrix, certain
structures appear, which can be studied selectively: Horizontal columns and vertical bars correspond to a certain
E X and Eγ , respectively. Most importantly, transitions to
any level at Elevel are appear as diagonals and can be selected by requiring the condition E X = Elevel + Eγ . To take
advantage of the excellent energy resolution of the HPGedetectors, the events fulfilling this condition (gate) are then
!
Article available at http://www.epj-conferences.org or http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/epjconf/20159301053
EPJ Web of Conferences
4 Transfer experiment:
Figure 1. p-γ coincidence matrix of the 92 Mo(p,p’γ) experiment.
Due to the good excitation energy resolution and the very good
γ-ray energy resolution, all transitions to low-lying states can be
completely resolved.
119
Sn(d,pγ)120 Sn
Recently, a transfer experiment has been performed with
the new setup to investigate the PDR in a pioneering (d,pγ)
experiment. By using this reaction on 119 Sn, the singleparticle structure of the PDR in 120 Sn was investigated,
since this reaction represents a neutron stripping. After applying a gate on the outgoing proton channel in the ΔE-E
plot and on ground state decays, the preliminary spectrum
as seen in Fig. 2 was obtained. A clear excitation of states
in the PDR region was observed as well as peaks from
the individual states previously assigned to the PDR in an
NRF experiment [7]. The analysis of this experiment is
still ongoing and the excitation and de-excitation of states
in the PDR region will be investigated.
Table 1. Observed decay pattern of J = 1 states of 92 Mo in the
PDR energy region (up to E X =7 MeV).
Ji
1
1
1
1
J πf
0+1
2+1
2+2
0+2
# of transitions
23
11
8
4
projected onto the γ-ray axis for further analysis. Due to
this procedure, several advantages can be achieved: First
of all, the peak-to-background ratio is greatly improved
compared to the ungated spectra. Most importantly, the
level scheme and branching ratios can be extracted rather
easily with the additional information on E X . However,
the calculation of branching ratios also relies on the correct determination of detector efficiency and angular correlations, which will not be covered in this article.
3 Inelastic proton scattering:
92
Mo(p,p’γ)
Last year, a proton scattering experiment on 92 Mo was performed at the 10 MV Tandem accelerator in Cologne to
investigate the PDR in this nucleus. A 10.5 MeV proton
beam impinged on a 0.6 mg/cm2 self-supporting target of
94% enriched 92 Mo. The average beam current was 20 nA
and the experiment lasted 5 days. The goal of the experiment was to investigate the decay branching of previously
observed J = 1 states [5] below the particle threshold by
taking advantage of the p-γ-coincidence technique as explained above. For many states, a sizeable decay branching to excited states was observed. A summary of the decay pattern up to 7 MeV is given in Table 1. For all these
transitions, branching ratios will be determined. However,
the analysis is still ongoing and some aspects of the setup
(e.g. efficiency and angular correlations) still have to be
accounted for before branching ratios can be determined.
Afterwards, they will be compared with theoretical calculations within the Quasiparticle Phonon Model [6].
Figure 2. γ-ray spectrum of the 119 Sn(d,pγ)120 Sn experiment obtained by requiring protons as ejectiles and gating on E X ≈ Eγ ,
i.e. ground-state transitions, as explained in 2.3. Low-lying transitions and strong dipole transitions are marked with spin and
parity of the initial state.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the DFG (ZI 510-4/2).
S. G. P., M. S., and J. W. are supported by the BonnCologne Graduate School of Physics and Astronomy.
References
[1] J. Piekarewicz et al., Phys. Rev. C 85, 041302(R)
(2012)
[2] B. A. Brown and A. Schwenk, Phys. Rev. C 89,
011307(R) (2014)
[3] E. Litvinova et al., Nucl. Phys. A 823, 26 (2009)
[4] D. Savran, T. Aumann, and A. Zilges, Prog. Part.
Nucl. Phys. 70, 210 (2013)
[5] G. Y. Rusev, Dipole-strength distributions below the
giant dipole resonance in 92 Mo, 98 Mo and 100 Mo, PhD
thesis, Dresden, Germany, 2006
[6] V. G. Soloviev, Theory of Atomic Nuclei, Quasiparticles and Phonons (IOP Publishing Ltd, Bristol, UK,
1992)
[7] B. Özel-Tashenov et al., Phys. Rev. C 90, 024304
(2014)
01053-p.2